


Connection lost, you're breakin' up

by ascendedGodhead, lemon_demon



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Angst, Depression, F/M, Humanstuck, M/M, Minor Sollux Captor/Aradia Megido, Miscommunication, Non-Chronological, Stalking, The Author Regrets Nothing, Translation in English, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:01:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24522772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ascendedGodhead/pseuds/ascendedGodhead, https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_demon/pseuds/lemon_demon
Summary: Denial, doom and unreliability.
Relationships: Eridan Ampora/Dirk Strider, Eridan Ampora/Sollux Captor
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lemon_demon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemon_demon/gifts).



> all credit goes to lemon_demon who translated the text and improved it  
> thank you so much bro  
> the text wouldnt have been finished without you

You broke up with him a year and a half ago. You broke up with him a year and a half ago, and your life became more quiet, more peaceful, more stable than it was. You've got a girlfriend. You've got a job. You've got a therapist. Things are finally going well for you.  
Of course, you meet him on accident. This town is too small—not just for both of you, but for anyone who decides to live here—and you're slightly surprised that you've managed to not cross your paths. However, the last party of this level happened four months ago and you missed the fuck out on it under very reasonable circumstances.  
In your memories, he was so different.  
'Hi,' you say awkwardly. He echoes you right back in a soft voice. Doesn't even look at you.  
You have no need to create the illusion of a conversation. In fact, Eridan takes his cup and walks away.  
'What a spectacular party,' you think to yourself, watching carefully as he nestles in the corner to keep drinking himself into oblivion for the rest of the evening.  
Honestly, you kind of expect the usual Ampora bullshit. You kind of expect him having a fight with Vriska (again), making Feferi upset (again), getting wasted outside till five A.M. and boiling over his loss or over truth-or-dare.  
He is only... drinking. But at one point you just don't care anymore, 'cause heeey, you all came here to have some fun, and Aradia's cheeks are redder from alcohol, and she laughs, and she drags you down from a windowsill, even though you resist.  
You wake up the morning after: ruffled, messy and hangover.  
Aradia and Feferi are both with you. You're trying to spot the familiar dumb-looking blonde lock of hair and a scarf which isn't better at all. You wonder if his hair looks dumber bleached than it does dyed in violet.  
It seems like you're still drunk.  
Eridan isn't here.  
'Corpse party.' quietly jokes Aradia, glancing at her friends who got lucky to fall asleep in the most uncomfortable poses.  
Later you ask Vriska—she stands on her legs, and it's a fucking miracle, one among many others that high as shit Makara can never shut up about—if she knows where Eridan went.  
Her X-ray glare is hard and intense on you. You feel the radiation.  
'Someone picked him up.'  
'Who?'  
But she bares her teeth and doesn't respond.

***  
A week passes.  
You still have a job, still have a girlfriend and still have one (1) therapist appointment.  
You message Eridan Ampora.  
You're unpleasantly struck by the fact that you don't need to remember your old password.

TA: ED, lii2ten, ii ju2t want two make 2ure youre ok.  
TA: you looked kiinda crappy.  
CA: im fine.

He still haven't fixed his keyboard, you think. And he put an actual dot at the end of the sentence. That's a whole fucking progress on punctuation for Eridan Ampora.

TA: fuckiing hell, ED, ii know when youre not. talk two me.  
CA: but i just said.  
CA: im fine.  
TA: ED, goddamnit  
[message isn't delivered]  
TA: what the  
[message isn't delivered]  
TA: are you actually fuckiing blockiing me?  
[message isn't delivered]

Is he actually fucking blocking you?  
You can't recall the last time you've been this angry... Well, yeah, since the breakup. Eridan was always into dramatic gestures and stupid 'guess yourself' games; you've witnessed his anger, witnessed him freaking out without a reason, crying, holding back his rage.  
But you've never witnessed him being indifferent.  
From day one you kept catching each others attention. He actually despised you when you got close with Feferi. He actually tried to fight you. He wasn't himself. You held his hands—oh Gog, just who taught this idiot to fight—and his fingers trembled.  
Then he raised his head and looked at you, and you expected to see wrath in those eyes, but you saw despair, pain and terror instead.  
You let go of him and backed off a little. He nuzzled your shoulder, cried so desperately as if you were dying right in front of him. You don't really remember what happened next: everything got mixed into one tight knot of sensations and feelings.  
You hugged him, hugged him as he choked on air and words, as he shook in tears.  
'It's not about Fef, it stopped being about Fef...'  
And then he kissed you. He kissed you with the light hint of salt, and maybe salt was exactly the thing you always needed.  
Explaining this to Feferi was a lot easier—she just hugged both of you and anxiously asked you to stay her friends. She looked worried, but the weight has been lifted from her shoulders. No one could refuse, no one even tried.

You moved in rather quickly. At first you tensed up with his presence, thought it's gonna be noisy, unnerving, _his_ in the worst sense of way; you expected obtrusiveness, intervention and things that aren't your own. Eridan sat silently, fingers lightly tap-tap-tapping on his keyboard, walked out on the balcony to answer a call, fell asleep in the most idiotic places while you coded and coded and coded; made you the best fucking coffee and kissed the top of your head after sneaking from behind your back only with a slight rustle. And you argued about movies, who's gonna take the joystick with cranky levers; he got annoyed because of something unimportant, he threw small things at you that happened to be nearby and then kissed you and stretched out the collar of your shirt to the point where it looked even worse than before; you shared all Netflix accounts and his music cloud, and although Eridan stubbornly kept using his ancient player, you have to admit: even his godawful opera sounded... decent like this.  
Pretty soon you found out that you didn't want to let go of him in the evenings when he called Uber and stood in the doorway with his shoes untied while rubbing at his eyes. You found out that you like to wake up next to him, like to lie next to him even when you're both buried in your devices. Eridan always easily put off anything he was occupied with and changed his plans for your sake; and you tried to find more time for him, just for him, with him by your side. Turned out you and him both liked nature; you would drive to the lake and the only things you would bring were food and drinks. Every day you passed doing nothing, acting silly; he splashed you with water, so you promised you'll drown him, but you were the one who didn't know how to swim.  
You still can't find the words to describe the night after he finally taught you.  
It was... magical, truly.  
You shared a bed with each other before, but at that point you've reached the sheer moment of dissolving.  
The second time you've reached it was after the mention of Vriska Serket.  
Everybody knew he was falling for her at some point (an idiot he was), but no one gave a fuck since he was sixteen and it barely meant anything next to the shit that happened to you and him.  
He came home cheerful,—you couldn't understand why, but responded to this cheerfulness anyway—it was a great evening and you both laughed about nothings like you haven't laughed in a while. And then he went to the balcony so he could talk with Serket, and he talked, talked; the feeling was slowly oozing out of you as the world surrounding you lost its colours, as it got filled with dust and all of a sudden lacked the oxygen; and you took a shower, and you stuffed your pizza into microwave, spilled hot coffee from the coffee maker, when Eridan finally appeared, and with a shy smile he informed you: his phone overheated.  
You started nagging him and couldn't stop. He couldn't, too, and although he did look like a fish thrown out of the warm water right on the cold ice, he always had a skill of leaving his perplexity behind to take up on the anger soon after.  
And soon after, the anger led you to sex.  
That was the day when you shattered the jug of a coffee maker.  
Eridan was left with a scar on his cheek and a whole bunch of long tiny cuts splattered across his body.  
And you found yourself holding a bloody piece of glass in your hand.  
You were sure he was going to leave you, kill you, report you to the police.  
He disappeared for a few days, didn't answer you anywhere, went offline.  
And then he got back to you at three A.M., and he hugged you as if nothing has ever gone wrong, and he told you in a casual-like tone: 'This won't happen again.'  
You immediately broke down into promises-apologies-reassuring, but Eri didn't listen to you.  
He set up a new law and you had no wish to find out what would happen if you failed to comply.  
'I love you,' you both said at the same time.  
Everything came back.

To fall to dust, slowly and inevitably.  
Megido returned to you from her land of sand and wind bleached out by the sun, she was tanned, strange, scoffing and—somewhere deep down inside—unwavering as a sphinx.  
You didn't notice how you began to spend more time with her, and with her it turned unessential, like she made every minute spent together matter and everything else—centuries of humanity existing—she casted down to ashes. She saw how something small and meaningless could have weight to it and she talked about the actual importance of things that are happening right now while the news are bristling with wars and suffering.  
You gave her a ring with the solomonic seal, no intent, no guy-gives-his-girlfriend-a-ring implication and all this relationship crap. She calmly accepted it and only said that she's going to wear it on a chain when she's busy with excavations, and then it was obvious you haven't watched 'The Hobbit' yet; you didn't like it at all, but it was fun, and you payed more attention to smiling Aradia.  
There was a time when your head was cracking from the inside out because of your migraine, and she kissed you, she kissed your forehead chastely; her cool touch took the pain away from you, took the noise out of your mind; and the lines tangling in your eyes she made vanish into darkness, she made you realise how long ago you actually felt something remotely close to calmness.  
Well, you wouldn't be you if this realization didn't make you act like an asshole; so that's why you haven't talked to Aradia or Eridan for two weeks, though Aradia just said that ‘s0llux im glad if you decided t0 take y0ur time and get s0me rest’ only to be left with no response, and Eridan spammed you with messages, made a complete mess out of your log and once he even killed your phone's battery. And then he had a grand fight with you.  
You couldn't blame him, really, but you've always succeeded at blaming yourself: for fucked up relationship, for not trying hard enough, for the smell of medicine in your brother's room, for red marks on the hospital bills.  
And for not being able to stand your brain boiling in your skull after hearing someone scream.  
It was the first time when you saw Eridan this scared, and he squeezed the strap of his bag while staring at the remains of your phone on the ground—this image was burned into your memory.  
That evening you called your doctor.  
And texted Aradia.


	2. Chapter 2

You are 17, and you think that people have to love you because you: are pretty, smart and definitely better than others, a glowing sunshine in the middle of pitch black.

You are 19, and you are unloved. Unloved—the word is your aura and a mark—and hell, you don't know how, but it sticks to you. You're not a part of the company. You're not a friend. You're the 'fuck, not Eridan again', and even Karkat says ‘well, I can't just leave this goddamn disaster on his own’. You've already shut up about Fef. You've shut up so hard that your lungs ache with the silence. You hope that she'll be stuck with your hatred, and then you blame yourself. You hope that your hatred will destroy Sollux, that he'll choke on it, that it'll burn a seal on him, and then you hate yourself.

You are 20, and you laugh when you kiss Sol who doesn't want to let go of you.

You are 22, you're huffing at Karkat, and after that you chat in the kitchen till six in the morning and fall asleep next to each other, and Terezi pokes you with her cane, offers you her hand in a friendly gesture, so you awkwardly get up from the coach, whole body numb.

You are 23. You pack Sollux's stuff and he takes the box with a shy crooked smile. You're holding yourself together; you congratulate him on a new place to live in; you say that everything's gonna go well with him and Aradia; you don't hear a word. You won't cry in front of him, never again. (You cry, right behind the door, as soon as Sollux leaves.)

You're 24. You have a list of things you're grateful for, you have a list of people you're grateful for and you have pills. Other pills. Doctor, it seems like they aren't helpin'. Doctor, it seems like nothin' is. Days are grey. Feelings are grey. I think I'm still jealous of him. I think she was a bad friend. (You forget the way she looks). I need someone. Someone who pulls me out of it. (You keep getting bank emails and spam for half a year, and they don't even know your name).

Live keeps putting you on your places. Feferi is still a heiress of Crockercorp, no matter how hard she tries to refuse it. (She doesn't, not really, to be honest, their millions give her the opportunity to be joyful and sweet without experiencing the boredom of daily payout-surviving).  
Sollux—still captivated by circumstances. His father looks worse and worse, and then there's one time when you see the elder Peixes: seems like she's sucking all of his strength out of him, literally like a vampire would.  
You're still Ampora.  
You don't belong here.

You're 24, you think about suicide and you think how fucking dumb it is. Everything surrounding you is noisy and frightening and sticky with smoke and sticky on your palm from the glass you’re holding, and you don't know this yet, but that's your first panic attack: you are now destined to be together for a long, long time. You don't realize that your eyes are wandering and then you catch a sight of a white shirt and sunglasses. In march, in the evening. How very necessary.  
And it flashes in your memory: Dirk. Strider.  
He notices you.

***  
He buys you coffee instead of alcohol, and so this is how it all begins. (This is how it all begins: with the fact that he even sees you). It looks like he's glad to receive your messages. He compliments you, though his face is unreadable, and he laughs when you ask him to be more specific.  
He notices that you're freezing and wraps you up in his jacket.  
When you kiss for the first time, you maybe feel a little bit better, even.

***  
CA: dirk  
CA: i knoww youre probably sleepin  
CA: its just that wwe havvent seen each other for a wweek  
CA: an  
CA: we left it on a shitty note  
CA: i wwanted to apologise  
CA: i mean i wwant to  
CA: fuck anywway sorry i flipped my shit i regret it  
CA: ill drivve in tomorroww morning an wwell talk okay good  
CA: i feel like wwe need this  
TT: Bring some coffee with you, too. But not from Starbucks, it lacks in taste, caffeine and soul.  
TT: Stop typing. We'll talk in the morning.

***  
You see your reflection in a mirror. In a showcase. In a car window.  
You pretend that it's not you. You don't smile like that. You're adorable (Dirk's voice says to you.) You're shining (Sollux says to you.) The reflection bares its needle-sharp teeth, hisses at you, goes down into the depth.

***  
'well youre like making bro happier,' with a fake indifference Dave Strider shrugs his shoulders and finishes his beer (the fourth one.) 'ikea shark dumb presents your birthday is highlighted in his calendar he was more worried about this than he was worried about christmas and this is a fuckin' family celebration if you didnt know wait how can you not know youve already watched the whole christmas crap with karkat.’  
You glance at his hand. There's a band-aid on his middle finger. With a dotted design since the ones with ponies weren't there. You know that because one day you've gone through all of the little local shops in this town—Dirk hates uncovered cuts and he tried to convince you with a perfectly blank face that a band-aid design plays a big role in the process of effective healing—and also because-  
'oh no,’ says Dave. ‘i knew that a mention of christmas crap would cause flashbacks.’

***  
Karkat pats your shoulder and tells you that he's glad, you fucking asshole, Eridan, be happy and stop bullshitting me, I'm sick of it.  
'I love you.' you repeat when you bury your head against Dirk's shoulder to hide your face.  
(Or maybe it says the beast with the teeth sharp and long.)

***  
You're able to see other people again. Vriska. Feferi. Aradia. Sollux. No.  
Not when he holds Aradia's hand. Not when she smiles at him.  
Not when he looks peaceful and the black circles under his eyes have almost faded.  
You drink, you stare at your phone's screen for the whole evening, and you keep scrolling through the old logs.  
The text is yellow.

***  
You don't tell Dirk about yourself. Well... You tell him that you want coffee. That you're cold. Or that he has beautiful eyes. He really has beautiful eyes and he's handsome, so you don't need to lie about that.  
You don't tell him you want to throw up the caffeine and neuroleptics. You don't tell him about forgetting what month it is or about forgetting to eat, or about forgetting his birthday. You didn't tell him you were bored and took sleeping pills that miraculously even made it to this moment; you just told him that you got tired at work.  
He remembers the date of your first meeting.  
Maybe, in another life, you had a chance to be happy together. Be together, chat easily and about anything, care for each other, love without a doubt, give each other time as if you had an infinite amount of it.  
Fuck no, you don't believe in this kind of shit.  
You just want to push yourself off and break the surface.  
Even if it will drown him.  
When it will drown him.

***  
Sollux Captor messages you.  
Break the surface, you remind yourself.  
The block button becomes grey after you press on it.

***

You smoke on the balcony. You promise Dirk that you'll quit it. You tenderly laugh (Feferi laughed like that) at his request to stop. You gently touch the spot behind his ear and kiss him when he shudders.  
Your smirk falls down.  
Dirk Strider is admired by almost everyone. You’re admired by many. You: are pretty, smart and definitely better than others, a glowing sunshine in the middle of pitch black.  
You think: prozac and xanax.  
Dirk takes your cigarette, breathes the smoke in, slightly closes his eyelids and slowly breathes out. You notice that his fingers are trembling a little and you notice the dark circles under his eyes. Even his irises look darker.  
'You never talk about things you see in your dreams.'  
He breathes in again.  
'This, however, is not the only topic you don't discuss.'  
You wrap yourself up in a blanket. The cigarette gets smaller and smaller relentlessly.  
'Don't get me wrong, I'm not accusing you of anything—would be ridiculous to do that in my place. I'm just pointing this out. In some way, I think it's fair.'  
Dirk turns to you, his posture straightening.  
'Ask.'

***  
'We have to move in.'  
'M-m, yeah, sure.'  
You're already bored. You're really bored. This is a right word, isn't it? You think about living with him, living with someone, and your guts twist into a tight knot of snakes. You know things will end up badly. You know it as if it was printed into your personal history: grey paper, typewritten font. Nothing new will happen. Things will end up badly, painfully and awkwardly, you've seen all of it already, you don't want it anymore, you don't want it just like in your childhood when you know they're gonna yell at you and the space around you expands and you're so tiny in it, and your ears are suddenly filled with cotton, and you can't hear a word.  
No, bored is the wrong word, but you don't have anything better.  
You're not afraid of your knowledge.  
It's a pity you can't lie to yourself—only to your loved ones.  
[Yes, dad, it's serious. Yes, I remember. Yup, I'm glad too. Oh c'mon, my temper isn't that shitty. No, if he runs away it'll be a district center, not another state. Honestly, I don't understand how I got so lucky that he noticed me at all. Damnit, dad, stop, what's with that face? I'm not gayin' all over. Hey, but you love your dead gay son. Alright, Alright, I'm cuttin' off my shitty jokes. Of course. Now, let's get back there, I'm pretty sure Dirk's already freakin' out after your inspection.]

***  
You text the virtual therapist app.  
(Yes, you're actually talking to an AI.)  
(What's worse, you named him Sol.)  
Now you have a friend.


	3. Chapter 3

He actually fucking blocked you, and your next actions aren't really consistent with personal boundaries, common sense and respect.  
You send Eridan a keylogger. It's terribly easy; you know which emails he ignores and which reads carefully, following links.  
All logs are neatly sorted on your server. All of them.  
All of his texts, all of his texts to Dirk, a bunch of random letters, google search history, all of his messages to Karkat, Feferi, Roxy, in an order of the file's weight descending.The amount of everything is ridiculously small, and it makes you feel calmer until you realise the most obvious thing: he just talks to them aloud; in real life.  
Aradia finds you when you're deep in stupor. You're clutching an empty cup. She carefully sets it on a table, sits next to you and takes your hand in her own.  
'This is the moment when you realise how lost you are, right?'  
She, in fact, only states it.  
You think about endless lines that ED constantly sends to a server of 'an app created to help you with the feeling of loneliness and anxiety. Please, note that this app won't replace the real doctor consulting.'  
And receives automatically generated answers.  
You feel a lump coming up your throat; a lump you want to spit out.  
'I'm sorry.' you say.  
'I know,' she responds, hugging your shoulders. 'But it's okay. Or will be.’  
Aradia never lies. 

***  
Everything gets a little bit better.  
Maybe there is enough concentration of active substances in your blood now.  
You start spending more time with Dirk. You're almost living in both houses since Dave and Karkat welcomed you under their wing. You like being with them, breathing in the same air, eating pizza, arguing about nothings and global philosophical questions, taking care of them. The presence or absence of pineapples in pizza isn't up to discussion. You remember that it's for the best to leave out of the order anything containing crabs and that Striders equally frown at wine, preferring something stronger or often—to not drink at all.  
All four of you are the perfect company, even though you're terrible at races and awfully good at shooters, and Karkat is amusingly scandalised when Dave teases him for losing a game. Even though you watch different movies and there was a time when you had an actual fight about award nominators. Even though Dirk's taste in literature is disgusting and you don't forget to remind him of that. Even though dubstep and Wagner are forbidden on the neutral territory.  
You never want to hit a nerve. Never want to dig in too deep.  
You don't belong here.  
You know it.  
Your reflection knows it. It looks at you in sorrow, palm pressed to the glass, and says: get back.  
'...get back to Earth.' says Dirk. 'Eridan, do you read me?'  
You blink. You're sitting by the cafe table.

***  
TA: 2eriiou2ly, KK, what the hell? couldnt you ju2t 2ay 2omethiing iin liine2 of 'your ex boyfriiend 2tarted datiing D2, now we have a fuckiing famiily reuniion at all tiime2, were friiend2 wiith each other and we 2hare our feeliing2'?  
CG: YOUR EX BOYFRIEND STARTED DATING DIRK STRIDER, NOW WE HAVE A FUCKING FAMILY REUNION AT ALL TIMES, WE'RE FRIENDS WITH EACH OTHER AND WE SHARE OUR FEELINGS, THERE IS JUST ONE FUCKING PROBLEM: MY GODDAMN FRIEND SENDS ME PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE TEXTS ABOUT ME DARING TO NOT INFORM HIM ON ALL THIS.  
CG: AND ABOUT HIM NOT BEING FUCKING HAPPY AFTER HE DUMPED HIS BOYFRIEND FOR THE SAKE OF HIS OWN FAMILY REUNION.  
CG: I'M NOT JUDGING YOU, YOU PIECE OF SHIT. BUT PUT TOGETHER THE REMAINS OF YOUR THOUGHTS THAT HAVEN'T GOT FRIED YET IN YOUR INFLAMED BRAIN AND THINK: WHAT ON FUCKING EARTH DO YOU EVEN WANT?  
CG: IT WOULD BE VERY IN TIME, BECAUSE I SUSPECT THAT YOU'RE NOT THE ONLY ONE WHOSE BRAINS ARE TOTALLY COOKED.  
TA: care two explaiin.  
TA: fuck.

***  
'sol' you type in. 'sol i hate myself so much im the fuckin worst i have all there is to have but im so unhappy an i dont fuckin understand why an anyone on my place would choke on joy an i cant im so empty it feels like hell they love me they make me warm but im -459,67 fahrenheit inside i fuck things up everythin around me i turn dim cold dead'  
'Sounds really sad! Do you have anyone you could talk to about this? If you don't, I'm always here for you.'  
The fakeness makes you sick. You uninstall the virtual therapist app. You stare at your screen.  
You try to imagine yourself in details telling Dirk Strider that you feel alone. You can see the worry in his eyes, splashing over the edges.  
Let's ignore that you're able to see his eyes at all.  
You can imagine how Dirk worries about you while you watch the town being swallowed by tsunami.  
Well, this town. The centre of the state is hopelessly far from the sea.  
What you think about is heavy mass of water knocking you out, covering you whole, taking you away, suffocating you, and you look at the flawless, blue sky.  
So you don't tell a thing to Dirk.  
The only problem is that he isn't blind.


	4. Chapter 4

Your name is Dirk Strider and once upon a time (clarifying: march, evening) you appear in a bar.  
If we were in a noir story, you'd be tragically drowning your past and your future in alcohol, but you actually needed to take care of some constantly glitching equipment—Meenah has asked you for this two times already, so it wasn't very fucking polite of you to avoid your duties.  
Your phone overheated after you received a huge amount of notifications (all of which could be basically interpreted as 'sorry di-stri but callie caught a virus and yknow how it is so yea sorry') and, even though you managed to spend some of the time on making sure that Roxy and Callie didn't need your help right now, it turned out that you were completely free this evening.  
That story ended with you finishing your cider and going home.  
Fortunately, it happened in the other timeline.  
Because you've had about three sips of it when you noticed a man staring at you as if he was watching his whole family getting murdered. Probably, via napalm.  
The man seemed vaguely familial.  
All these circumstances brought you to the point where you actually made some kind of a physical effort, got up, came up to him and started a conversation.  
You expected him to avoid your questions, then tell you something rather personal, smile sadly and with a face a bit brighter say that it's gonna be alright. You supposed it would be this way; you've witnessed enlightening conversations with strangers under the generous amount of ethanol and read of them, too.  
He told you 'Oh, I broke up with him an haven't felt positive emotions since then.'  
Or 'One day something corrupted me an my life so hard that I'm not sure I'll ever be able recover from that.'  
Or 'Mostly, I feel nothin'.'  
He didn't bother with filtration, didn't bother to hide things from you—he trusted you, and your spite was growing and growing.  
Someone, please call a postmodernist to play it out ironically.  
[I agree, it's sickening to watch in real life.]  
The screeching of the voice in your head is distinctly metallic.  
[Oh no, he says everything you're hiding under the layers of ironical post-irony aloud and doesn't give a single fuck. Just look at him. What a git.]  
With the same advance you could try and critically listen to Rosetta stone. Or make fun of him. Or poke at him for naively trusting a random companion.  
He didn't ask, didn't dramatize, didn't demand the legitimisation of his feelings.  
He talked, and the way these not directed at you phrases reached something inside made you feel unpleasantly chilly. He hit you with splashes of obnoxiously genuine emotions; if it was his 'nothin' then you wouldn't want to be in the way of anything bigger.  
It would be more pleasant if he did it on purpose.  
For example, if you actually set his whole family on fire via napalm or at least once crossed paths with him. (These two reasons could stand together, as it seems.)

***  
This whole situation is fully under your control, you are absolutely sure. You have a great, beautiful, amazing relationship: you take care of him while making insignificant efforts to keep his physical form in a decent condition, he again and again makes you  
[And here goes another wrong and miserable connotation. Stop pretending like the avoiding of your past is not your own conscious, rationally justified and completely shitty decision.]  
remember.  
You've never experienced synesthesia, but you close your eyes and Eridan's voice feels cold. Straight lines  
[And that was the only straight thing about Dirk Strider.]  
flicker in your mind, glowing and dying out, traced from one point to the other.  
He tells you about his conclusions, about his feelings, about strategy and tactics, and you're barely holding yourself back from pointing out that love isn't a battlefield or a victory march.  
[This is excellent. And exhausting. You're so good at playing your Thoughtful Listener's role as if you had the audience to notice and analyze your acting. How about this: stop trying.]  
'There was a time when I seriously considered some kind of a... solution for everythin'. Like, with the help of magic or somethin'.'  
He spells the word 'magic' in disgust.  
'That was one of those shitty nights when you can't sleep an remember all of your mistakes. I mean, the usual. I was layin' an thinking: what if all of it got erased, like, by some fuckin' miracle?'  
You think about Jake's slightly silly manner of speaking and about his voice, think about his confident motions, his laughter, the long scar on his left arm, about the smell of gunpowder and sun.  
'...an all of it would come back. He’d come back. Or he’d never leave in the first place.'  
The endless scrolling of orange text. No single answer.  
‘Would I be happy? Of course, that's the best fuckin' position: look back an realise you were up to your neck in this paradise an safety, even though it seemed to you like your life was a crappy tragicomedy script. Only you can't look back before you leave. You won't be able to estimate it. Won't fuckin' understand what an idiot you've been with your heart displayed outwards.'  
You still don't comment.  
'But you know you'd fuck up anyway. There's no miracle of love. No destiny. No-fucking-thing. Only you and your own mess.'  
You recall Jake's eyes full of guilt. And the relief in them.  
'And so I realised I want no retcons, no wand swings, no miracles, nothing. Fuck this bullshit. I realised anything can change at any given moment, in any way, and if I want to live, I have to shut the fuck up and learn how to do it, looking at all my mistakes. All of them. Or else... It's not gonna be me anymore.'  
'If.' you softly clarify.  
'Stop pickin’ at words, Strider, it's annoyin’.’

***  
You don't really like your face on the photos. In your personal archive synchronized on three cloud services and two hard drives you have only three pictures with you (and a few gigabytes of pictures with people close to you.)  
On the first one you stand out in front of your older brother; face out of focus, messy hair.  
The second one is from a crime chronicle.  
You were looking into a camera in that moment, but it's not showing on the photo. Your bruise, however, is kindly highlighted with the post-editing filters.  
The third one is made by Jake.

***  
'No suicidal crap. It's dumb and awful.'  
You're both standing on a bridge.  
You feel a little bit out of it as you stare at the neat flow of water. Stare at the branch splattering in it, stuck in the base. Eridan looks in the distance; he's shivering when he fixes his coat.  
Technically, you're both freezing on a bridge.  
'Sure, from a historical point of view it's all absolutely meaningless—dead or not. Statistics. I've stopped thinkin' that I was born for doin' great things a long time ago, no shit, I was born for royally failin'. I can't give up on observing, though.'  
He's silent, and you're not sure if he can see you nodding.  
'An… It's stupid, but I also can't give up on naively believing in individuals who change the course of events. I find it... fascinatin'.'  
You blink, he finally turns to you. His face is distorted in an erratic, crooked smile.  
'Have you ever wanted to be the new Alexander? Get up on the barricades, holding a flag? Do you want a musical about yourself? A rap about you tragically being the hero no one could understand? Just imagine, Dirk.'  
He makes a wide fidgety gesture with his hand. You notice the blood clotted on his fingers. Probably from a small cut.  
'Me? I died for him. Me? I trusted him. Me? I loved him.' he quotes. Your thumb perfectly fits the hollow of his tendon.

***  
With the exact same resoluteness he says 'I fell in love with you.’  
He isn't asking, isn't dramatizing, isn't demanding the legitimisation.

***  
[Look at what we've got here. The vague promise of a real boyfriend who doesn't deny the fact that he has feelings for you. Your kokoro goes doki-doki in his presence. His goes thump-thump. Will you hold hands? Will you have the gayest wedding in the world? Will he cook pancakes for you, dressed in your shirt? Will you get a corgi?]  
'Fuck off,' you say emotionlessly to your reflection. 'Just fuck off.'  
[Ah, right. How could I miss the fact that he more likely will burn his hand to the stove because he forgets in which world he is. Congratulations, Dirk, not only you are gay now, but you're disastersexual as well. Each day brings new discoveries.]  
You aren't disastersexual.  
God, Eridan isn't even your type.  
He just happened to you in the moment when you told yourself that you won't try to repeat the tricks performed by professionals at home. You have Dave, you have Roxy, Jane, Karkat, Calliope, your closest people and your pals, and it's the best fucking thing, actually the best, you're not even gonna poke the word 'relationships' with a ten-foot stick.  
Especially when it comes to someone who might not be ready for them.

***  
When Eridan's camera lens is aimed on you, you raise your hand in a warning.  
You like his snapshots, in general. Or, to be more specific, you like his way of making them: how quickly he changes his pose to catch the right angle, how he goes still after the camera starts clicking and the aperture closes and opens again.  
One time he drops to his knee, lifts up the camera, and you immediately remember Roxy with her rifle.  
Sure, it's a silly thought. Rifles and psychiatrist prescriptions don't function together in a single equation.  
Eridan ignores your gesture.  
At night of the exact same day he sends you that snapshot while sitting in a pillow pile on the bed two meters away from you.  
[This is even better than Times Square. Or the kiss of Rhett and Scarlett. Or Harry and Sally. Luke and Leia. William and Kate. Shiro and... What was his name, again? Such a shame that there is nothing epic on the background.]  
It's you on the picture, kissing each other. Light makes your closed eyes noticeable under your shades.

***  
'Dirk,' Eridan calls you from his room. 'Stop pretendin' like you're still preparin', you're goin' to look deadpan an awesome anyway. Just so you knew, I hate this ability of yours. It's outrageous.'  
You walk out, he looks at you critically, fixes your tie and then you finally realise that your boyfriend is standing right next to you, that he puts his hands on your shoulders and kisses your cheekbone and you're not going just anywhere, you're gonna meet his parents (parent), oh god, fucking hell, you weren't ready for this.  
You're not nervous and Eridan totally doesn't stroke the back of your head, pressing you closer to him. No, not at all.

***  
[But agree with me, it's such a great pleasure: knowing that you have nothing to do with his broken heart and his deep problems. Not a single thing.]  
'Hey,' he speaks up in a gentle tone, pulling a weirdly looking object out of the blister pack. 'You're staring like you have something personal for these pink little pieces of happy shit.'  
'I have something personal for their consumer. You've changed the drug.'  
'I... Yeah, I did. Not on my own, damn. It's a recommendation, official as Pyrope's face.'  
'Does it mean you feel worse?'  
'It means that a lack of serotonin and dopamine grabbed my ass more tightly so fucking me up would be easier. Any questions now?'  
'Not at all. I'm visualizing.'  
He pokes your rib with his elbow, then smiles and moves the locks of hair out of his eyes.  
You change your cuddling position so it would be more comfortable, while he's messing around and untangling his earbuds. He passes you one.  
'C'mon, not opera again, Eri, I'm serious.'  
He doesn't respond. He looks you in the eyes and in a matter of seconds the relaxed expression of his face fades only to be replaced by fear, as if you've just promised to strangle him with a wire. The cold sensation under your diaphragm mirrors this fear and for a moment it's like you're about to fall, but then Eridan leans on your shoulder, puts the little device in your ear, closes his eyelids. You listen to the first chords and the thrumming water, and you ask yourself: can Eridan feel your heart beating hard in your chest?


	5. Chapter 5

Your name is Dirk Strider, it's 5:07 AM and a sudden sound wakes you up. You're trying to understand what's happening and where you are, but then it becomes clear that this sound was nothing but the humming of an airplane, you're in your bed and the best thing you can do is hug Eridan as tightly as little orphans don't hug their plush toys. He never wakes up from that.  
There's only one problem. He isn't here.

***  
Your name is Vriska Serket and a phone call wakes you up. You recognise the eights in that number even before you see the picture.  
'Feeeeeeeeferi. How can I help you?' Peixes hears your pretentious hospitality. ‘Are you really calling me from another city just because you miss me?'  
Feferi bursts into indistinct explanations, but you cut her off with a fake yawn.  
'I'm pretty sure he's gonna appear in a motel few days later, not able to bear the harsh reality without his lavender latte. This all is, of course, extremely nice, but I don't see any point in worrying.'  
You tap your fingers against the headboard, barely holding yourself from a confused sigh: is it actually that hard for him to just accept his life of a loser without making so much fuss? This is the dumbest way to attract attention, but if something does, in fact, happen, the town will be savoring the details for a while.  
'Long story short, I dunno and I don't care.' you finish the call and get up from your bed.  
Alright, fuck it. You're generous. You're ready to give this prick a place in the lights of soffits and stop being the main character, only if he'll make sure to do something outstanding.  
Like, at least leave medical examiners things to work on.

***  
Your name is Sollux Captor. It's 13:34 PM and you've finally found time to deal with an experimental feature which, of course, doesn't work as it's supposed to. Besides, its experimental state implies that there isn't enough people in this world that would actually be able to handle it.  
You type another question into the search line when a message pops out in the corner of your screen:  
TT: This is Dirk Strider.  
TT: If you have any information regarding Eridan, I recommend you to share it immediately.  
You take a deep breath and sooth down the wave of shiver washing over your body. Of course, you start to think about the hacking-and-stealing-personal-data-shenanigans right away.  
You count to ten, both ways, and only after that you reread the message.  
It's fucking nonsense.  
TA: hold on, what iinformatiion? what are we even talkiing about here?  
TT: Eridan disappeared and I'm asking everyone I can reach.  
TA: fuck.  
TA: when?  
TT: Somewhere between 1:00 and 5:00 AM. With his car.  
TT: You don't know anything about that, I suppose?  
TA: no. ii hear thii2 for the fiir2t tiime.  
You look at the Google logo.  
You look.  
And look.  
TA: ii have an iidea.  
TA: and ii bet youre not gonna liike iit.

***  
It's currently 14:22 PM, you and Dirk Strider are in Dirk Strider's car, there is a nice light breeze coming from the conditioner, the air smells like oranges and you both are heading south away from this town.  
The silence is crushing you physically.  
You slide lower down the seat and let out a sigh.  
'I didn't do this on purpose, damn. ED is a piece of dumbass when it comes to the network security. I didn't hack him, he just forgot to close the data access for me.’  
'Yup.' responds Dirk. His jaw is clenching. He keeps his eyes on the road. You keep your eyes on him. Even now he's wearing his stupid shades.  
'Everything will be alright, I'm sure.' No, you don't feed him this false light-hearted shit, it gets stuck in your throat and fills it up tight. You cough.  
'Water's on the backseat.' dryly says Dirk.  
'Thanks.' you answer.  
Water is, in fact, on the backseat. Cold.  
The silence is crushing you again.  
You look at the dot on the map of your laptop as if it has moved at least on a fucking millimetre for the last half an hour. You know this place very well; it's a beach on the opposite side of a touristic zone. If you don't know where to get down from you might think that everything there is covered by high rocky shores unsuitable for a boat or any form of relaxation activity. Eridan knows, however. You really hope that he just went fishing. Well, for the first time in ten years. Without a fishing rod. Without fucking anything. Without informing anyone. At five in the morning.  
A chuckle breaks through your gritted teeth. Dirk gives you a glare.  
'Nerves.' you say.  
Dirk only takes a breath, slowly and very calmly.

***  
Your name is Eridan Ampora and you've been laying on a thin rocky beach for ten hours.  
It's a thoughtful and reasonable decision of a responsible adult.  
You can't move because you can't make a decision, you can't take the earbuds out even though your players battery died a while ago, you just can't do anything anymore.  
When a shadow hits your face you can't even get scared.  
'Eri,' says Dirk. 'Are you okay?'  
You look at Sollux. For a brief moment his face goes completely still. He crosses his hands over his chest.  
You have a sunstroke, probably. Or you fell asleep. Or you're hallucinating. Or all of it at the same time.  
You blink. No, it keeps happening.  
'The hell?' you ask.  
'This question is coming from a man who vanished into thin air without bothering to leave a note or answer the phone.' says Dirk.  
You check your wristwatch.  
'Fuck.'  
'Eridan, please calm down. Are you okay?'  
'I was gonna return,' you make sure to say every syllable straight to Dirk's face slowly and carefully. 'I was gonna return, pack my stuff, say my goodbyes, get the hell outta your life an leave my shitty mobile at the bottom of the ocean.'  
You feel small, you feel so small and then your ears are full of cotton again.  
'I'm not okay, I'll never be okay, I'm fuckin' sick of it, I don't have any strength left, I'll never break the surface, I can't stay with you anymore, I can't lie to you anymore, I can't lie to myself anymore, it's a fuckin’ mess.'  
You start shaking.  
'I live with you, I love you, I love him, I hate myself for that, I hate myself for not cuttin’ it off.'  
You really want to cry but only feel the burning ache inside.  
'An I also, as it seems, went nuts. Completely. Followed by a ninth symphony an angelic singing. Congratulations.'  
You feel so empty that you begin to lose your hearing again.  
You lay back down on the sand; a pebble is digging into your shoulder blade.  
'Now fuckin' leave already, I've finished my amazin' performance an I can't stand seein' you both.'  
Tears stream down your temples and get into your ears right in time.

***  
Your name is Sollux Captor and you're trying not to laugh. Nerves.  
'Fucking hell, typical Eridan. Disappears, throws a tantrum, demands us to leave, lays down, cries. ED, can you stop being an idiot, please, we'd be really glad if you did, thank you.'  
Dirk looks at you like he is going to kill you as soon as you end your tirade.  
Eridan covers his eyes with his hand.  
'Can you stop being a dick? Not now. Be a dick whenever you fucking need, but not now.'  
He almost yells while saying the last words and you notice the whiteness of his knuckles. You take a step closer to him, but Dirk firmly grabs your shoulder. You shake his hand off with one rough movement.  
'Fuck off, yeah? I have a right to participate in this disastrous festival.'  
'An how so, I wonder.' Eridan stands up on his legs heavily, eyes still closed. 'The fuck are you doin’ here?'  
‘Guess who forgot to turn off the access for monitoring your geolocation.'  
'One oblivious moron. I'm pretty sure he already regrets it.'  
'Of course, he has his show with calling the police and FBI taken away.'  
Eridan looks at Dirk.  
You don't want to see this.

***  
Your name is Dirk Strider and right now what you really need is to stay chill. Some part of you wants to leave this conversation, leave this beach, drive back home, pack Eridan's things, block him, continue living your life.  
Change your name and ride up to Seattle.  
[No, State Of Maine.]  
'I didn't call FBI. Only the National Guard.'  
You just considered your options in case that dot on the map wouldn't be anything at all. Or only the empty car, still water surface; long police interrogations and the procedure of searching for a body.  
Eridan smiles.  
God, you almost hate him for that because his smile is genuine.  
'Let's clear something up. What exactly were you lying to me about?'  
Eridan looks away.  
'About everything.'  
You wait.  
'About my feelings. I don't know if I love you. I don't know if I can live with you. With anyone at all. I don't remember what we've talked about last week an I don't give a fuck. I don't know anythin’ about you an I don't give a fuck.'  
'Bullshit.'

***  
You spit it out before you even have a chance to think twice.  
If Aradia was here she'd say something along the lines of 'when you want to destroy something, go all the way.'  
And smile.  
'You're drowning in guilt every time you forget anything that doesn't involve you. Your endless complains about you being an asshole because you believe that you don't love Dirk could be used as wallpapers. There's just the right amount.'

***  
You felt beaten down before, and now you just feel like someone finished their job by cutting you right in half.  
Your body acts faster than your stuck in trance brains do, and when you bring a fist to Sollux's face you don't even notice the lack of resistance; the sight of blood doesn't stop you, not for a moment. Dirk does.  
'Not that I mind, but what's going on, after all?'  
'This son of a bitch was readin’ my dialogues!'  
Dirk fixes his eyes on Sollux, knits his eyebrows.  
'What the hell, man. What's your problem?'

***  
Blood drips down your broken nose, falls on the ground, and you huff.  
'No idea why we suddenly decided to bring up my shit, but it's quite simple: hi, I'm a sick fuck and I've been watching your dear boyfriend because one time I had a thought that he actually can, y’know, decide to drown himself in a lake.'  
You say this and you finally realise what's been implicitly bothering you all along.  
'Because it looked as if you, in fact, didn't even fucking care.'  
This time you get hit in your jaw.

***  
You desperately lack the time to properly process everything, your thoughts jump from one thing to another, while your vision coldly memorizes the knockout.  
This conversation went the wrong way.  
You have no idea where it was supposed to go.  
You haven't planned it.  
'Dirk,' you say. 'Dirk, please.'  
He cuts you off, raising his hand.  
'I didn't want to. I don't want to lose you.'  
The end of that phrase you push out of yourself crying.

***  
Now you definitely have something to do with Eridan's troubles.  
You both are sitting on the sand, leaning on each other, and you hug him, even though he stopped shuddering. He doesn't takes his hand away from yours; your palms are coated in blood.  
'He's right, in a way.'  
You nod in Sollux's direction; he walked off to the water edge and is now violently splashing it at his face.  
Eridan’s fingers tighten.  
'I fucked up when I decided that you'll deal with your life on your own and that I don't need to fix anything because it's not my mess.'  
It sounded better in your thoughts.  
'I mean. You're totally dealing on your own already. Not minding... this. I just cowardly decided that you were okay while you balanced between putting my brain on its place and settling down your life. As much as it's even possible to be okay in your position.'  
'What position.' Eridan rolls his eyes. 'Look at me. The privileged part of civilization cries in jealousy while I'm wastin' my father's paychecks, go to my work only so they wouldn't forget about my existence, do fuckin' nothin', hallucinate and fuck myself over with existential bullshit.'  
'And here our competitor performs a depreciation maneuver. All judges: maximum score.'  
'Strider.'  
'It wasn't me laying on the ground and promising to dump me because you love me. Or hate me.'  
Eridan looks away.  
'Eridan. I'm not trying make it about irony. I'm just slightly shocked by the intensity. Like, the iceberg turned out to have another piece underwater, which is as big as Texas, and it won't just melt to make our lives easier.'

***  
‘Wow, guys, you're awfully fucking fast. You needed so little to reach this thought. And now, please care to throw someone's car keys at me so I could leave this bay of crying and confessions.'  
'Go fuck yourself, Captor.' answers Eridan while Dirk winces and massages the bridge of his nose. 'First of all, your dirty hands won't touch my treasure. Second of all, we haven't finished with you yet.'  
You sigh.  
'Oh c'mon, what else now? Are we gonna publicly reflect on the reasons of me growing into a creepy asshole? Well I don't fucking know them.'  
'Sol.'  
This is a very wicked goddamn trick coming from a wicked Eridan.  
'What.'  
'Quit actin' like shit. I've just put all of the cards on a table, have some respect.'  
You sigh again.  
Your nose hurts, your shirt is bloody, you want to swallow a bunch of Tylenol and go to sleep, but hell.  
'Yes, I still care about everything that's going on with you. Not like it justifies me, of course.'  
You recall his words.  
'I'm sorry that you love me. You have a crappy taste. And the feeling isn't mutual.'  
'I know.' says Eridan calmly. 'I perfectly understand.'  
'You don't understand shit.'

***  
‘Alright, I don't understand shit.' you easily agree because you have no strength left to do otherwise.  
Sollux shakes his head.  
'Now you're gonna tell me to fuck off because your dumb all-or-nothing principle makes you grab people by the balls. Out of pure love, of course.'  
'And then you're gonna respond the same way because your moments of enlightenment an the ability to talk about shit that's actually happenin’ don't go without a punch to the face. Or two.'  
'One-one.' humms Sollux. Hesitates for a moment when he looks at Dirk, but then sits next to you.  
Suddenly, there is no trace of thought in your head.  
Together, in silence, you watch the daylight gradually changing. You put your head on Dirk's shoulder—he hugs yours, and for the first time in years you don't think about anything at all.  
The sun goes down.


End file.
